Iceland’s largest volcano, Katla, was just moved to yellow status. But that isn’t all that’s concerning. There have also been over 500 earthquakes in Iceland in the last four days.

Experts now believe that a volcanic eruption that could be quite large, may soon occur in Iceland. A series of 40 small earthquakes occurred just North East of Mount Fagradalsfjall two days ago, with the final one felt in Reykjavik, measuring at almost 4 on the Richter scale. Following tremors at Katla in South Iceland and a glacial river flood in Múlakvísl, the Icelandic Met Office has raised the status of the famous volcano on its “Aviation Colour Code Map for Icelandic Volcanic Systems” from green to yellow. People have even been warned to stay away from the Múlakvísl River because of the odor of sulfur.

The color code of Katla volcano was changed to yellow due to a glacial flood in Múlakvísl river. The glacial flood is now decreasing and seismicity in the area is thought to be normal. The Icelandic Meteorological Office has however decided to keep the color code for Katla at yellow until at least after this weekend.

So, looked a little more into this, as that website doesn't seem to be the most unbiased news source

Yes, the info on the quakes is completely accurate, according to the Icelandic Meteorological Office website (who knew they had an English version). If I read their charts correctly, the quakes are really stacking on top of each other, and it is the time between and number of said quakes on that site that takes the status from green to yellow to red. One of those quakes was squarely at ground zero of Katla. The Independent and CNN say it was a 4.0 quake.

This being said, a google search on Iceland+volcano+earthquakes indicates the same kind of articles were coming out last year at this time about Katla. Seems they are quite common for the region at this time of year (not sure of the science, but I wonder if the warmer temps are part of the explanation). In fact, last year there were two 4.5 quakes at ground zero of Katla and it did spew.

Not that anyone living near a volcano shouldn't be cautious with quakes, but this seems to follow a pretty typical pattern for the past few years.

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